The 90-minute finale is set to include a segment on “the rise of China and tomorrow’s world,” a topic certain to highlight the candidate’s starkly different positions on currency issues and trade relations with Beijing. An unstated but possible separate topic is the European debt crisis and the two men’s views on the U.S. role in it — views that are strikingly similar, at least in public. See MarketWatch's Election 2012 coverage.

That’s not the case with China, with which the U.S. had a $28.7 billion trade deficit in August. Romney has pledged to name China a currency manipulator on the first day of his presidency, while Obama has time and again skipped that designation in favor of gentler pressure.

“China has been a currency manipulator for years and years and years,” Romney said in the pair’s second debate on Oct. 16. He said officially designating the country a currency cheat would allow him to put tariffs on Chinese goods if U.S. manufacturers are being taken advantage of — a red-meat comment for workers in manufacturing states like Ohio and Michigan.

Obama counters that he has applied pressure, and has gotten results. In his second debate with Romney, he said the value of the yuan
USDCNY, +0.0509%
has risen against the dollar by 11% since he’s been president — an inflation-adjusted estimate since June 2010.

Scott Paul, executive director of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, says both men are aggressive on China and that the issue connects with voters. But Paul would ask Romney for specifics about what steps he would take after he names China a currency manipulator. Obama should be asked about the still-undervalued currency and the big trade deficit, Paul said.

“The macro picture still doesn’t look terrific,” said Paul.

Sparks could also fly if moderator Bob Schieffer turns his questioning to the impact of the nearly three-year-old European crisis on financial markets and Americans’ wallets.

“It would be surprising if [Schieffer doesn’t] ask about the euro crisis and the implications for the U.S. economy,” said Kent Hughes, director of the Program on America and the Global Economy at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

Romney’s likely response? Let the Europeans deal with this themselves.

The former Massachusetts governor stated flatly in an interview with CBS last June: “We are not going to send checks to Europe. We are not going to bail out the European banks.”

Obama, more nuanced, has gone from offering vaguely worded pledges of U.S. assistance to stopping just short of agreeing with Romney. After meeting European leaders in late November 2011, Obama said: “I communicated to them that the United States stands ready to do our part to help them resolve this issue. This is of huge importance to our economy.”

But the helping hand is gone from his more recent statements.

“The challenges facing Europe will not be solved by the G20 or by the United States,” Obama said on June 20 at a press conference following a G20 summit in Mexico. “The solutions will be debated and decided, appropriately, by the leaders and the people of Europe.”

Both men face a conundrum when it comes to Europe. Americans could see loans to aid Spain or Greece as “throwing good money after bad,” says Bruce Stokes, who directs the Pew Research Center’s Global Economic Attitudes project.

“The political atmosphere for either one of them doing very much is limited,” said Stokes, citing the unpopularity of the International Monetary Fund among some U.S. lawmakers as one reason.

China pushes Americans’ buttons much more directly, and a get-tough attitude makes for good U.S. politics. But being too tough can complicate relations with a major trading and diplomatic partner. Beijing was angered, for example, by the Senate’s passage in October 2011 of a bill allowing new duties on goods from China and other countries. China’s government also reacted angrily to the tone of the Oct. 16 debate.

In their third debate, Obama and Romney will have to weigh which is more important: further antagonizing an important partner with harsh rhetoric, or bashing China to reel in undecided voters.

Monday’s 90-minute debate is scheduled to begin at 9 p.m. Eastern, and take place at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fla.

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